Felsenthal bass on the rise

CROSSETT- With large, clear-water lakes such as Ouachita, Bull Shoals and Beaver Lake being prominent fixtures in the Arkansas bass tournament scene, anglers may think the southern portion of the state doesn’t have many good fisheries. Nothing could be further from the truth. In fact, many of Arkansas’s most productive fisheries reside in the bottom third of The Natural State. Millwood, Monticello, Lake Chicot and the lower Arkansas River have claimed their spots in Arkansas bass anglers’ must fish destinations, but one fishery deserves much more praise than most anglers are willing to give.



Felsenthal National Wildlife Refuge’s primary purpose is to provide habitat for migratory waterfowl and other migrating birds, but its extensive system of rivers, streams and sloughs set up to make the perfect setting for big largemouth bass. The Ouachita and Saline rivers both run through the property, combining with the rest of the system to create the Felsenthal Pool. The refuge has plenty of year-round bodies of water to deliver excellent habitat while rising and falling water throughout parts of the year keep the system flush with nutrients and benefit the growth rates of fish.

“Felsenthal has been a great fishing destination for years, but it’s really coming into its own recently,” said Jason Olive, assistant chief of fisheries. “It may not get as much attention as lakes closer to more populated parts of the state, but local anglers near the Arkansas/Louisiana state line know how good the fishing can be.”

Andy Yung, AGFC regional fisheries supervisor in Camden, agrees about Felsenthal’s overlooked potential, but says word is slowly getting out.

“Tournaments held on the Ouachita River in South Arkansas and Northern Louisiana have had some impressive showings from the Felsenthal Pool,” Yung said. “We see anglers from Louisiana launching at the Grand Marais ramp during the tournament that have never even fished here before, because they know this is where they’ll have the best chance of catching big fish for their tournament.”

According to Olive, much of the current angling success revolves around varying water levels during the last few years. High water during the spawn flooded vast amounts of cover-laden areas, where fish could spawn successfully and their young could find enough refuge to grow.

“When the Ouachita River is 5 feet high, Felsenthal grows from 15,000 acres to 36,000 acres, with most of that being prime spawning habitat for fish,” Olive said. “And that water stayed high long enough to increase fingerling survival and give us some great year-classes of largemouth bass.”

Just as high water was needed to produce an excellent crop of fish, this year’s lower-than-usual water levels have played a role in increasing the harvest.

“Bass really have a lot of flooded woods to swim around in that are hard for anglers to reach when the water gets high in spring,” Olive said. “But this year’s low water has made those fish much more accessible, which has led to some fantastic fishing. I don’t normally fish Felsenthal until May because I don’t like fishing it when the water level is high, but this year I started fishing there in February and have caught a lot of good fish this spring.”

Olive says in the last few years anglers have had to wait until June and July for water levels to recede and for bass to move out of the woods before the fishing has gotten very good, but the variability of the system has played into anglers’ hands and is making for a banner year.

“Another key element of Felsenthal’s recent surge has been the initiation of a 13-inch minimum length on largemouth bass,” Olive said. “It has protected those large year-classes until the fish were spawning age, which made those high-water years even more effective at adding to the population in the fishery.”

Olive says minimum length limits often are not needed, and can even have negative effects on some fisheries where catch-and-release is the norm. But Felsenthal is one system where anglers keep their catch.

“Up to 40 percent of the anglers on Felsenthal harvested their catch in 2016, and it was even higher than that in previous years,” Olive said. “Some harvest is a good thing to reduce competition and increase growth rates, but with retention rates that high, a minimum length limit protects your next generation of spawning fish long enough for them to replenish the system. Again, minimum length limits aren’t a magic bullet for fisheries management, but they’ve worked well given the current conditions and angler desires at Felsenthal.”

All visitors on Felsenthal must have a signed, current copy of Felsenthal National Wildlife Refuge Public Use Regulations in their possession while on the refuge. A downloadable copy of the brochure and other information on the refuge are available at https://www.fws.gov/refuge/Felsenthal/.